Motorola to split...

[bezking708]

... with the radio division apparently becoming it's own company...

More here -> http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/ ... it-itself/

[resqguy911]

"The mobile handsets and home business will own the Motorola brand and will license it royalty-free to the enterprise and networking company."

So the public safety & government side will be the redheaded stepchild. Perfect.

[wazzzzzzzzup]

are we sure they are talking about the 2way business? it seemed to me they are referring to the cell phone side of mobile handsets, they referenced the droid.

[d119]

The way I read this, Motorola radios will still be Motorola radios, but it will be some other company, not the core Motorola.

Jesus H. Christ on a popsickle stick. Charming!

And we wondered why all the cheap labor in Poland was designing today's Astro25 systems.

"QUICK! We're taking on water!"

[RFguy]

I think that this is being mis-read.

The "mobile handsets" referes to the cell phone business, not the 2-way radio business.

[FireCpt809]

the two way , business ,public safety radio and RF engineering business is not going anywhere. They want to spin off cell phones and cable boxes and modems.. Old news

[Bill_G]

Well good. They never took advantage of the advances in cellular and applied them to public sector products. This will keep things nice and backwards. I mean, after all, P25 audio quality is light years ahead of the Motrac, and we like it that way. Not to mention the ability to aggregate bandwidth is so overrated, it should never be considered. Don't want hadji listening in now because private sector security is the sux. Another bold move by Motorola. Bravo. Pass the champagne.

[PETNRDX]

This has been passing around for awhile.
Means the cellphones & cable boxes will be built by "another company" and that OTHER company won't have to pay royalty money to M for the name.
Just shows how much more profitable the two way radio business is compared to selling millions of cellphones.
There is lots of profit and a long future building and maintaining (replacing) trunking radio systems for the Public Safety sector.
It appears to me that this is just going back to the M legacy business, which really always has been selling Pubic Safety type radios and systems.
I am thinking that they thought dealing direct to the public would be more lucrative, but that market is flooded with cheaper products (which is what the public wants) now they are just going BACK to the core business.

[Wile E. Coyote]

By creating tow completely separate business entities, Motorola is basically building a firewall throughout the corporation. It’s almost like they expect one of the two businesses to perform poorly, and this way they can isolate their losses. But which one do they think is going down the tubes?

-WEC

[wavetar]

This has been talked about for at least the last two years. Motorola has been getting it's ass kicked in the cellular business for the past decade or more...at one point they had over 70% of the Canadian market & over 30% of the U.S...now it's just a fraction of that. Once cellular really took off as a 'consumer' product as opposed to a 'business' product, they couldn't react fast enough to the changing landscape...people wanted cameras & music & web browsers in their phones, and Motorla was making crap like the v60 & v120. The Razr saved them, but they couldn't take advantage. Instead of coming out with exciting new models, they stuck with the same form factor & made the Razr2 and Krazr...whoopie. They are simply geting out of a marketplace they aren't very good at competing in.

[mancow]

I figured the Droid and Android would have been a huge boost to their revenue but maybe it's too little too late. I have one and it's probably the single best electronic device I have purchased in many years.

[STEVE W]

I may be old fashioned, but all I want to do on my Razr is talk, I don't take picture becasuse that is what a camera is for not a phone, i dont walk around like a Star trekker with a blu tooth in my ear as I am not that self important and I don't text as I can wait until I get to work or home to be on the computer. These phones with all the stuff on it are a marketing tool to take money from the pockets. Technology is great but 90% of the people I see use there phone as a toy and are wrapped up in themselves as they walk areound in an electronic daze talking and texting of no real importance. but that is my rant
73
Steve W

[escomm]

Motorola has been getting it's ass kicked in the cellular business for the past decade or more...at one point they had over 70% of the Canadian market & over 30% of the U.S...now it's just a fraction of that.

At one point they had 100% of the US domestic market.

[ledzep11]

At one point they had 100% of the US domestic market.

At least until Nokia invented GSM, and a handset that would work on it. It only took Motorola 10 years to come up with a GSM phone that actually worked worth a darn..

[wavetar]

Motorola has been getting it's ass kicked in the cellular business for the past decade or more...at one point they had over 70% of the Canadian market & over 30% of the U.S...now it's just a fraction of that.

At one point they had 100% of the US domestic market.

Maybe in 1986 or something...I was talking about when there was actual competition...the early to mid 90's when everyone & their dog was either making or branding cell phones...Panasonic, Novatel, AT&T, Audiovox, Fujitsu, OKI, Mitsubishi, Tandy/Radio Shack...you name it. If you were an electronics company with more than 20 employees, you put out a phone! Motorola was the 800-lb gorilla & they let it slip away.

[escomm]

In 1986 they already had the market cornered for 3 years. The thing is that while it's nice they once had 30% market share, it's more telling to the discussion to point out they had it all. I think that the point here is that the Motorola's "eroding" market share is not anything new, in fact they've pretty much been behind the ball since the Dynatac days.